SOA-C02 Practice Question: AWS Backup cross-region copy for regulatory…
Regulatory requirements mandate that all RDS and EBS backups are replicated to a secondary AWS region within 24 hours of creation. The company has workloads in us-east-1 and must replicate backups to eu-west-1. Restoring from the secondary region must be possible without manual copying steps during a disaster. What service and configuration implements this requirement?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to assume they need to use separate services (like Lambda or DLM) for each resource type, missing that AWS Backup provides a unified, managed solution that handles both RDS and EBS snapshots with cross-Region replication and direct restore capabilities.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Create an AWS Backup plan with a cross-Region copy rule that replicates recovery points to a backup vault in eu-west-1 within 24 hours
AWS Backup is the correct service because it natively supports cross-Region copy rules that automatically replicate recovery points (including RDS snapshots and EBS snapshots) to a backup vault in a secondary Region within a specified time window. This meets the 24-hour replication requirement and enables direct restores from the secondary Region without manual copying, as the backup vault in eu-west-1 contains the replicated recovery points ready for use.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Create an AWS Backup plan with a cross-Region copy rule that replicates recovery points to a backup vault in eu-west-1 within 24 hours
Why this is correct
AWS Backup's cross-Region copy rule runs automatically after each successful backup job. The copy is encrypted with the destination vault's KMS key. In a disaster, operators restore directly from the eu-west-1 vault — no manual cross-region data transfer is needed. A single backup plan can cover multiple resource types (RDS and EBS), satisfying the consolidated requirement.
- ✗
Schedule a Lambda function that calls CreateDBSnapshot and CopyDBSnapshot to replicate RDS snapshots, and CreateSnapshot and CopySnapshot for EBS volumes to eu-west-1
Why it's wrong here
Custom Lambda scripts are a valid pre-AWS-Backup approach but require writing, testing, and maintaining custom code for each resource type, handling errors and retries, and ensuring the schedule reliably runs. AWS Backup provides the same capability as a managed service with no code required.
- ✗
Enable RDS automated backups with cross-region replication and configure EBS snapshot copy separately using Data Lifecycle Manager
Why it's wrong here
RDS cross-region automated backup replication works for RDS only. EBS Data Lifecycle Manager (DLM) handles EBS snapshot replication. Managing two separate tools for two resource types duplicates the configuration and does not provide a unified view of backup compliance across both. AWS Backup unifies both.
- ✗
Use S3 Cross-Region Replication to replicate the backup bucket containing RDS and EBS snapshots to eu-west-1
Why it's wrong here
RDS and EBS snapshots are not stored in customer-accessible S3 buckets. They are managed by the AWS service internally. S3 CRR applies to objects in customer-owned S3 buckets — it cannot replicate RDS or EBS recovery points.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SOA-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the SOA-C02 exam.